by Sam Thacker

Lute

Stringed instrument - 14th to 18th centuries. Extremely lightweight, pear-shaped body. Six pairs of strings run from tuning pegs.

Tuning of the lute is G/c/f/a/d'/g'. The player's right-hand fingers pluck the strings, which are stopped by the left-hand fingers. The English lutenist John Dowland was outstanding among Renaissance composers for the lute.

Violin
Bowed stringed instrument, the highest pitched member of the violin family. Other members of the violin family are the viola, cello, and double bass.

The violin has four strings tuned a fifth apart, to the notes g, d', a', e''. On early violins the strings were of pure gut. Today they may be of gut, gut wound with aluminium or silver.

Viola
Alto member of the violin family, having four strings tuned c g d1 a1 (c = C below middle C; a1 = A above middle C). About 2 to 7 cm longer than the violin, and tuned a fifth lower. 

Viol
Bowed stringed instrument popular from about 1500 to about 1750. The six gut strings are tuned (in the tenor) G c f a d1 g1 (c = C below middle C; d1 = D above middle C), same as the lute.

Less common was the double bass, tuned an octave lower. Music for bass viol includes the Brandenburg Concerto no. 6 by J. S. Bach.

Violoncello
Large, low-pitched musical instrument of the violin family, held between the performer's knees. It has four strings tuned C G d a (C = two C's below middle C; a = the A below middle C). Its range extends over more than four octaves. During the baroque era unaccompanied cello suites were composed by Bach.

Contrabass
Largest and lowest-pitched member of the violin family. The double bass is usually about 1.8 m (about 6 ft) high and has four strings tuned to sound EE AA D G (EE = third E below middle C; G = second G below middle C).

Harp
Musical instrument in which strings, sounded by plucking, run between a neck and a sound box (also called the body or resonator). The strings run perpendicular to the sound box (instead of parallel, as on a guitar).

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